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¼ PLATE AMBROTYPE OF CAPTAIN, LATER COLONEL, CALVIN H. WALKER, KIA 1864, WITH SERGEANT, LATER CAPTAIN, J. S. WALKER, 3rd TENNESSEE

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Formerly in the renowned collection of Herb Peck, this world-class Confederate quarter-plate ambrotype shows brothers Calvin H. and James S. Walker of the 3^rd Tennessee in uniform and descended in the family of the former until sold by a descendent along with Calvin Walker’s sword, sword belt, revolver and diary. Likely dating to 1861, the image is  glassed, matted, framed and housed in the bottom half of a brown embossed and gilt blindstamped leatherette case. The clarity, resolution and detail are outstanding. The photographer only very delicately and lightly, partially gilt some details and added a little red tint to the cheeks of the sitters.

The Walker brothers are shown seated next to one another, from the knees- up, wearing similar severe expressions and both posed with folded arms. Needless to say, the family resemblance, accentuated by the similar beards, is remarkable. On the viewer’s right Calvin H. Walker, born 1823, wears a dark, officer’s frock coat and trousers, the coat showing a single row of brass buttons down the front and three on each cuff, along with a pair of shoulder straps with a dark ground, clearly showing the double bars of a Captain. He wears a prewar style wheel cap tilted back slightly so as not to shadow his face with its visor. The cap has a light color band around the base the photographer has lightly gilt, along with a number “3” surrounded by a lightly gilt wreath at the top front of the cap (details are laterally reversed in the ambrotype.) The photographer lightly gilded his buttons and the borders of his shoulder straps and touched his cheeks with red. All the colors were carefully applied and do not detract from the image.

Seated next to him, brother James S. Walker, born in 1832, is clothed in a light colored (we presume gray) battle shirt and slightly darker trousers. His shirt cuff is faced with a yet lighter color material that is bordered by a dark stripe around the cuff opening and pointed upper edge. The front of the shirt bears a similar light band down the center, with small shirt buttons showing along its middle, also bordered on either side by a dark stripe. He wears a forage cap apparently matching his shirt in color, and having a dark band around its base with a lighter color braided or bullion band in its middle. A single strand of light-colored piping is visible running up the front seam of his cap, which also shows a narrow chinstrap. A couple of his shirt buttons were lightly touched with gold. His cheeks were also delicately tinted.

Born in Maury County, Tennessee, in 1823, Calvin Harvey Walker first embarked on a military career, attending West Point 1840-1842, but changed course to medicine, graduating from the Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia 1847. By 1850 he is in Giles County, TN, where the census lists him as a physician, apparently married soon after and also took up farming, being listed as both a farmer and physician there in the 1860 census, married, with wife and three children ages 5, 7, and 9. He was elected Captain of a Giles County company of volunteers, which joined the 3^rd Tennessee as Company E, in whose ranks his younger brother James S. Walker, born 1832, served as 5^th Sergeant (promoted to Ordnance Sergeant in December 1861.) The regiment officially organized and was accepted for state service May 16, 1861, spent two months arming, equipping and drilling, and entered Confederate service on August 7, 1861, with some reorganization- Walker’s company being redesignated Company G and his appointment officially given that date, among other changes.

They first saw action under Buckner in Kentucky and in February 1862 took significant casualties, 13 killed and 56 wounded, in the fighting at Fort Donelson, with most of the regiment caught up in the surrender of that post and imprisoned for seven months until paroled at Vicksburg in September. It officially reorganized Sept. 26, with Calvin Walker elected to Colonel upon promotion to General of Col. J.C. Brown, perhaps helped by five of the companies being from Giles County, and his brother was elected Captain of his old company, whose designation was changed to “H.” But, the regiment was not officially exchanged and available for active duty until Nov. 10.

They saw fighting again at Springdale, MS, at Chickasaw Bayou in late 1862, in 1863 at the Siege of Port Hudson, and at Raymond, MS, where they lost 32 killed, 76 wounded and 68 captured of 548 engaged. During the Vicksburg Campaign, they were among the forces at Jackson, MS, fighting from July 9-16, losing another 22 of 366 engaged. At Chickamauga they suffered 93 more in killed, wounded and captured, out of 264 engaged, but escaped Missionary Ridge and the fighting around Chattanooga that closed out the year without much loss. After wintering in Georgia saw they further action in the Spring in the Atlanta Campaign seeing action at Rocky Face Ridge, Sugar Creek Valley, Resaca, New Hope Church, and Powder Springs Road, also known as Kolb’s Farm. There as part of Stevenson’s Division and in a brigade commanded by their first Colonel, John C. Brown, they took part in in misguided attack by Hood’s corps against troops under Hooker and Schofield on June 22. The division came under heavy Union rifle fire and artillery fire from several batteries. Calvin Walker was killed instantly by an artillery round that, in ghoulish irony given the prominence of the brothers’ beards in the photograph, “blew off all his head except chin and rather long whiskers.”

Calvin Walker’s body was eventually reinterred at Columbia, Maury County, TN. His widow was presented with the regiment’s flag by the color bearer who brought it home at war’s end. Brother James survived to surrender and be paroled with Johnston’s forces Greensboro, N.C., on May 1, 1865. He died at Nashville in 1892 and was interred there at the Tennessee Confederate Soldiers Home Cemetery, though an October 1892 newspaper clipping mentions a resolution by local Confederate veterans to move his remains to Columbia and reinter them next to Calvin, a rather fitting resting place given the photograph.

Readily available secondary sources often repeat unsourced material, but two stories are worth repeating. One is the possibility that Calvin Walker was the unnamed Confederate Colonel who famously demanded John Clem’s surrender at Chickamauga, since the 3^rd Tennessee was closely engaged with the 22^nd Michigan at points in the fighting. Clem’s claim of shooting the officer, of course, is another matter, though Walker was on furlough in November-December 1863.

On firmer ground is the story that Walker carried the nickname “Old Baldy” among his men. The regimental Chaplain of the 3^rd Tennessee reportedly recalled that at Chickamauga Walker rallied the regiment to a renewed effort by removing his hat and crying out, “Are you going to leave Old Baldy?” A similar story is told about him leading his men into battle at Raymond in May 1863, with the appeal, “I wish to say that I do not command you to go, but to follow this old bald head of mine . . .” Whatever the truth behind the anecdotes, they rather focus our attention again on his beard as perhaps a bit of compensation, and remind us of his fate.

This is remarkable image, with great clarity, presence, and history, worthy of the most discerning collection.  [sr][ph:L]

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